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Dr Audrey Giles B.Sc. (Hons), Ph.D., is a forensic scientist specialising in the scientific examination of documents and handwritings and, with over thirty years’ experience, Dr Giles is one of the foremost authorities in her field. She was formerly the Head of the Questioned Documents Section of the Metropolitan Police Forensic Science Laboratory (Scotland Yard). She now leads the scientific work of the Giles Document Laboratory.

Dr Giles trained in all aspects of Forensic Document Examination in the Questioned Documents Section of the Metropolitan Police Forensic Science Laboratory (MPFSL) in London, where she worked for thirteen years. In 1986 she was appointed Head of that Section supervising the work of twelve experienced scientists. In addition to carrying out her own casework, her responsibilities at that Laboratory included direction of research, Quality Assurance and the Training of Questioned Document Examiners. From 2002 – 2009 Dr Giles was registered with the Council for the Registration of Forensic Practitioners and was a Speciality Assessor of candidates for registration.

In 1989 Dr Giles left the MPFSL to set up her own independent Laboratory. The Giles Document Laboratory is equipped to the highest standards with the most up-to-date equipment available for Forensic Document Examination. The Giles Document Laboratory is accredited to the internationally recognised Quality Standard, BS EN ISO 9001 : 2008.

Dr Giles is an active member of the leading learned organisations in the field:
● The Forensic Science Society
● The American Society of Questioned Document Examiners
● The Gesellschaft für Forensische Schriftuntersuchung

She chaired the Forensic Science Society Questioned Document Group Meetings in 1987, 1991 and 1998. In 1999 she was appointed Chair for the Questioned Documents discipline at the 15th Triennial Meeting of the International Association of Forensic Sciences in Los Angeles, USA. She has contributed to scientific journals and forensic science text books and is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of the American Society of Questioned Document Examiners. She has been appointed as an external examiner by the University of Strathclyde and has appeared as a consultant expert on television and radio a number of times. In 1992 Dr Giles gave evidence to the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology (Sub-committee on Forensic Science), and in 1994 participated in the development of National Vocational Qualifications in Questioned Document Examination and in the Working Group for the Registration Council for Forensic Practitioners (CRFP).

Dr Giles has provided independent expert advice to Claimants, Defendants and Prosecutors in thousands of cases, both in British and international courts of law (including the International Court in The Hague) as well as Arbitration and Employment Tribunals. As an expert who deals with both civil and criminal cases, she has given evidence in the High Court, the Court of Appeal, the County Court, the Crown Court and Magistrates Courts. She has been trained in the role of Single Joint Expert Solicitor Crown Prosecution Service and routinely acts in this capacity

Barrie Warburton has had over 30 years experience in one of the UK’s top provincial Police Forces. Performing duties within the scene of crime department and intelligence units for over 22 years, he gained expert knowledge in crime scene management and the use of forensic intelligence as an investigative tool to support volume and major criminal investigations.

After retirement from the police force, he joined the Forensic Science Service (FSS) as an international Scenes of Crime Consultant, advising on evidence preservation, exhibit recovery, sample packaging, exhibiting and submission of forensic items to many overseas law enforcement agencies and forensic agencies including in Abu Dhabi, British Virgin Islands, Mauritius, Canada, Anguilla, China, United States, Turks & Caicos Islands, Cayman Islands Indonesia, Algeria and Australia.

His forensic project experience includes:
● Crime Scene leader on many international ‘cold case’ reviews to address outstanding undetected serious crimes
● Manager of implementation strategy to maximise detection rates in fingerprint and DNA identifications
● Responsible for the development of DNA and Fingerprint Identification procedures for a leading UK provincial Police Force Intelligence Unit, providing data for the UK Home Office
● Special Point of Contact (SPOC) for armed robbery intelligence
● Leading contact for dissemination of intelligence for the British Security Industry Association.
● Diagnostic review of various international scenes of crime departments, to maximise evidence recovery
● Assisted lead scientist in diagnostic review of various international forensic laboratories

As a result of this work he has developed DNA Intelligence Policy Programmes in conjunction with various governmental bodies and intelligence and scientific departments, he has acted as Senior Crime Scene Advisor on major and terrorist crime scenes and been Lead Advisor on forensic submissions to Senior Investigating Officers and Forensic Reporting Scientists.
He has been a member of Forensic Steering Groups defining ‘Best Practice’ in forensic methodology and has had much training experience in all aspects of forensic evidence recovery for Crime Scene Examiners and Investigating Officers and taught Crime Scene Awareness to students studying forensic degrees at UK colleges.

Charlie Stevens has had nearly 40 years service with the United Kingdom Border Agency (UKBA), formerly the UK Immigration Service, during which he worked extensively in all areas of immigration control work, in particular the front line border control at the United Kingdom’s major airports Heathrow and Gatwick, and at many sea ports. He had immigration postings to British Diplomatic posts abroad in India and Pakistan. He was also engaged in immigration enforcement work within the United Kingdom, tracing, prosecuting and removing illegal entrants. In addition, he spent time dealing with applications for British citizenship and presenting immigration appeals cases at Appeals Courts.

Charlie spent the last 15 years of his career as a manager and Head of the National Document Fraud Unit (NDFU), a part of the UKBA’s Intelligence Directorate. The NDFU is the United Kingdom’s centre of expertise in the detection of fraud in travel and identity documents and in document security development. Its primary role is in supporting front line UKBA immigration officers at all areas of immigration control activity both in the UK and abroad in recognising and detecting travel and identity document abuse. The NDFU is the national centre of excellence for suspect document examination. It trains and equips UKBA immigration officers with the skills, technology and information to recognise and detect document fraud. NDFU officers are expert document examiners who conduct forensic document examinations for the police and other UK Enforcement Agencies and attend courts as expert witnesses.

Charlie also had many responsibilities on behalf of the UK relating to travel and identity document security and development and in combating document abuse. He advised the UK Identity and Passport Service on the design and security of UK passports and the identity card. He assisted UK Government Departments in the development of a range of secure travel documents and driving licences. Internationally he was the UK representative to the EU False Documents Working Party and the EU Article 6 Committee, which devised secure EU common format documents such as visas and residence permits. For eleven years he was the UK technical advisor to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) New Technologies Working Group during its formulation of international standards and specifications for machine readable travel documents and ePassports. He was also the lead UK delegate to the G8 Migration Experts Working Group, the UN Crime Commission International Experts Group on Identity Fraud and Vice Chairman of the Council of Europe Committee on Identity and Terrorism. He was a Standing Committee member for the Immigration Fraud Conference (IFC), an annual conference of document fraud experts from over twenty countries. Charlie undertook numerous document security outreach projects on behalf of the UK in countries ranging from Nigeria to Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia. In retirement, he maintains contacts with the IFC and ICAO and is a member of the Editorial Board for the Keesing Journal on Documents and Identity.

David is a fully qualified Fingerprint Examiner, Crime Scene Examiner and Crime Scene Manager as well as being FERRT (Forensic Evidence Recovery and Retrieval Techniques) trained. He has much experience in preparing and presenting expert fingerprint evidence in courts of all types

David has a thorough working knowledge of:

● The UK National Fingerprint Computer System (IDENT1)

● Livescan, the technique and technology to capture fingerprints and palmprints electronically to be instantly compared with prints already in IDENT1

● All treatments and procedures used in a Fingerprint Development Laboratory

David has been an operational fingerprint officer for over 30 years and, whilst employed by UK Police Forces, was entered on the Home Office Register Of Fingerprint Experts as an expert fingerprint witness. He started work in Fingerprint Identification in 1979 at New Scotland Yard where he worked on one of the first AFIS (Automatic Fingerprint Identification Systems) in the world. He gained his Expert status in 1984 and spent 3 years throughout London as a District Fingerprint Officer examining many hundreds of crime scenes.

In 1989 he moved to Northamptonshire Police where he spent the next 18 years, first as a Scenes of Crime Officer undertaking scene examinations of all types ranging from theft of motor vehicles to murder. He also attended scenes in the guise of scene manager after the initial CSI examination, where a more technical and specialised examination was required from the Fingerprint Development Laboratory. He was soon made Head of Bureau, project managing the design and creation of the Bureau and the installation of both IDENT1 and Livescan. When the Bureau at Northamptonshire Police opened in April 1990 David had direct management over both the Force Fingerprint Bureau and the Fingerprint Development Laboratory. He has been awarded two Chief Constables Commendations and an Assistant Chief Constables Commendations for his work within Scientific Support.

In May 2008 David started his own company, Fingerprint Associates Limited, a Forensic Consultancy providing the Criminal Justice System with an independent and impartial review of fingerprint evidence to be presented in a large variety of cases, from criminal damage through to murders.

He has been seconded to Seattle in America working on cross border searching within the AFIS system database and to the Turkish Jandarma to give training on Sagem AFIS system. He has given presentations throughout the world, most notably China, Thailand and Slovakia, as well as in the United Kingdom. He is currently a consultant lecturer at Nottingham Trent University.

Jim Lee has 28 years experience as an examiner of questioned documents with the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Laboratory (USACIL), State of Florida Lottery and in private-practice.

He earned his Bachelor of Science (BS (Cum Laude)) and Master of Science (MS in Criminal Justice) degrees from Troy State University, Troy, Alabama.

He received his training in questioned document examination at USACIL and retired in 1992 after serving as the Division Chief of the Questioned Document Division, USACIL, Camp Zama, Japan. His rank at retirement was Chief Warrant Officer-4, culminating a career of more than twenty years as a Special Agent with the US Army Criminal Investigation Division Command. He then served ten years at the State of Florida Lottery as a Senior Special Agent and Forensic Document Examiner and Chief of Facilities Security, prior to his retirement in 2002. In 2003, after serving as the Director in the Forensic Services Unit of West Valley Police Department, West Valley City, Utah, he joined the Foster & Freeman team as a Technical Sales Applications Engineer. He has also established his own private practice in forensic document examination, Summit Forensic Document Examination Laboratory, Liberty, UT.

During this time he has also successfully completed courses run by the U.S. Secret Service, the F.B.I., the U.S. Public Safety Institute and Rochester Institute of Technology (R.I.T.) in subjects as diverse as typewriter identification, printing techniques for questioned document examiners and process color for flexography. These qualifications, together with the aforementioned practical experience, have led to him being an expert in all forms of questioned document examination and comparison.

These include:
● Handwriting, hand-printing, typewriting, printing devices and other types of mechanical impressions to determine identity or genuineness
● Examination of inks, papers and materials to determine genuineness, integrity, security, origin and validity of date of preparation
● Restoration and decipherment of charred documents, obliterated, mutilated, altered and impressed writings.

He is certified by, and a Diplomate of the American Board of Forensic Document Examiners (ABFDE) and a past Director of ABFDE, a member and past-Secretary of the American Society of Questioned Document Examiners (ASQDE), a member of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences (AAFS), a member of ASTM International, originally known as the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM), a member of the Utah Division of the International Association For Identification (IAI) and its parent body the International Association for Identification, a member of the Midwestern Association of Forensic Scientists (MAFS), a Charter Member of the Japan Division of the IAI, and past-President and Charter Member of the Southeastern Association of Forensic Scientists (SAFDE).

John Smith is currently employed as Senior Lecturer in Photography & Digital Imaging at the University of Westminster. He is one of the UK’s leading experts in the area of forensic imaging, with over ten years experience working for the major forensic science providers: first with the Serious Crime Unit of the Forensic Science Service (London laboratory) and then with Forensic Alliance and latterly LGC Forensics (Culham). John established Forensic Alliance’s Imaging Services and was instrumental in introducing their Fingerprint Service. He has a BSc (Honours) in Photographic & Electronic Imaging Science and an MSc in Digital & Photographic Imaging. He is a member of the Fingerprint Society, the International Association of Identification and the Imaging Science Group of the Royal Photographic Society.

John’s experience and expertise include:
● Attended at approximately seventy major crime scenes with more than ten UK police forces
● Forensic examination for fingerprints, footwear marks, blood and other body fluids
● Use of specialist lighting techniques, filtered light (eg. lasers, Crimescope, ultra violet lamps)
● Photography, digital image processing, enhancement and restoration
● Lifting and casting methods, chemical enhancement

The consistently high quality of his work has gained him many personal commendations and an international reputation. He has provided many tailor-made training lectures, courses and workshops for a variety of institutions.

These include:
● Fingerprint and Footwear Forensic team of the UK Home Office Scientific Development Branch (now PSDB)
● Various UK Police forces
● Kings College, London
● Lausanne University, Ecole des Sciences Criminelles
● University of Technology, Sydney
● New South Wales Police’s Specialist Location & Recovery Unit
● New South Wales Association of Fire Investigators

John’s University work includes teaching the scientific principles and applications of imaging systems; he is a member of the University of Westminster’s Imaging Technology Research Group and continues to conduct research in forensic imaging and marks enhancement. Through regular conference attendance, personal visits and academic channels, John has built up a worldwide network of contacts relevant to his specialist areas. Through his work as an independent forensic imaging consultant he can access this network to the benefit of a wider range of interested parties.